-Press release by NREGA Sangharsh Morcha, dated 19 May, 2018 Yesterday’s much awaited Supreme Court judgement in the Swaraj Abhiyan PIL has let down millions of National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) workers - the most marginalised citizens of India who need employment and social security. The Court has ignored the wealth of evidence against the brazen violations of the legal entitlements of NREGA workers and has allowed the Central Government...
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Farm, Fractured -V Kumara Swamy
-The Telegraph As Prime Minister Narendra Modi prepares to mark his fourth anniversary in power, V. Kumara Swamy takes stock of how hollow his promises to farmers have been. Will there be a price to pay? Hemant Patidar, a farmer, has been camping at the Mandsaur mandi in Madhya Pradesh with 15 quintals of “good quality” garlic for more than a week now. The price has been on a downslide for the...
More »Punjab scheme snub -Arnab Ganguly
-The Telegraph Chandigarh: The Congress government in Punjab, like the Mamata Banerjee dispensation in Bengal, has refused to implement the flagship health insurance scheme of the Centre. While the other north Indian states under BJP rule - Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand and Jammu and Kashmir - have signed the memorandum of understanding with the Union health ministry to implement the Ayushman Bharat scheme, the Amarinder Singh government in Punjab has refused to...
More »A triple blow to job guarantee scheme -Rajendran Narayanan & Madhubala Pothula
-The Hindu A lack of sufficient funds, rampant payment delays and abysmal wage rates are to blame The ?11,000 crore fraud that diamond merchant Nirav Modi is said to have created is a figure that needs to be put in perspective. The total amount of wages pending under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) scheme for the whole country (2016-17) was around ?11,000 crore too. This sum is a...
More »An open letter to Finance Ministers -TM Thomas Isaac
-The Hindu Political alignments should not come in the way of defending the fiscal rights of States My fellow Finance Ministers in the States, I hope you will agree that the award of the Finance Commission is vital to State finances. Some of us who met initially at Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala, and later at Amaravati, Andhra Pradesh, are worried about the implications of the terms of reference (ToR) of the Finance Commission...
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